The Russian Paralympic team has been illegally banned from participating in the 2016 Summer Paralympic Games, which closed on Sunday in Brazil’s Rio de Janeiro, Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Monday.

"The president is receiving today the Russian Paralympic team, they are our heroes," Peskov told journalists adding that the Russian Paralympians "were illegally banned from the Paralympics in Rio."

According to President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman, the fact of their suspension "does not change their status and their quality of absolute heroes, which they had proved on numerous occasions.".